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Hey guys, I just wanted to post this thread because of the lack of threads/guides that have information about defeating mech as Zerg. I went through the guides in the recommended threads section to find outdated guides with little information about how Zerg is combating mech since the neural parasite nerf.
Mech is a very powerful style and can be difficult to deal with if it isn't scouted properly and you don't have an overall gameplan when confronted with the matchup. These are the few styles I'm aware of when playing against mech:
- mass roach with upgrades and incorporating doom-drop play while eventually teching to t3
- upgraded ling + roach + infestors, teching quickly to t3 (although I haven't really been able to make this work)
- roach with upgrades along with infestors
- roach with bling drops (banelings on top of tanks are actually not bad)
What style do you guys think is the most effective vs. Terran mech?
My thoughts: I feel that the dynamic of ZvT mech is much like Protoss, but with units that are really cost-effective against your main midgame composition. This means that you really cannot afford to engage the Terran if he's sitting in his base and must resort to some sort of mid game harassment (via drops/nydus or multi-pronged aggression) to allow you enough time to expand, take map control, and eventually get to Broodlords.
I feel that mid-game infestors are not very useful, as neural parasite is very situational and fungal is really only good against grouped up vikings/hellions. I guess IT's would be pretty good for absorbing tank fire, but once broodlords hit the field, broodlings do a better job and don't cost any energy. Obviously the go-to composition is infestor/broodlord with some kind of buffer with roaches or upgraded lings.
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The following is just opinion. Mid master zerg.
It depends on the type of mech.
Basically, the best way to deal with mech depends on whether or not he turtles to 200 / 200, or pushes earlier, and whether or not he does it on 2 or 3 bases.
In addition, whether or not he supplements with either air (banshee) or some bio, or nothing.
If he is going pure mech, it's also important to know whether or not he is aiming for a lot of hellions, or just tons and tons of tank / thor, with some hellions.
Against most styles, I prefer to max out on 3 base 4 hatch, getting +2+2+2 roach bane, with lings if there aren't too many hellions, and once I max, sacrifice that army the moment he moves out from his base, then remax on roaches.
I get a late infestation pit, and don't really rely on infestors. Instead I rely on being able to remax and have 2 engagements vs his mech army.
But the most important part of this style is chosing where you engage: away from your base, and from at least 2 angles. You don't need a surround, but you need to get at least 2 sides when you engage.
If he adds in air, and is light on tanks, roach hydra is very good in my opinion.
If he supplements with bio, I feel that infestors is the optimal choice.
But I don't like mass drops, or banelig drops. Instead, I feel that making sure you get your +2+2+2 upgrades, and engaging near his base the first time, is the key to defeating mech. If you let him get to your base, and siege up, before you engage, I feel that I've lost anyway.
I am comfortable playing against mech where he maxes and push out on 3 bases, as long as I can keep him from a 4th.
I don't tech to hive before I have near 200 / 200, 3 base 4 hatch, base 4 and 5 building or done, and +2+2+2 done or near done. I feel too fragile if I rely on getting broodlords out in time to deal with his push.
I don't mind getting ultras baneling later on instead, as long as he never seem to go marauder or banshee.
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So are you just blowing up +2 blings on thors/hellions?
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yeah if i recall if you can hit 4 units at the same time banelings are always cost efficient. the banelings supply the necessary burst damage to take out terran's DPS instantly.
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roaches are always the best answer to mech, our mineral dump (hellions) suck against roaches, and it is hard for us to have enough gas to get enough tanks to deal with large numbers of roaches
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On March 25 2012 04:08 romelako wrote: So are you just blowing up +2 blings on thors/hellions? Yeah pretty much
As long as he clumps up his units, it's cost efficient enough. And, normally, he will clump them up.
I just lose if he gets 4+ bases without me scouting it and denying them. As long as I can keep him to 3 bases, it's fine.
There was a GSL match some months back of NesTea doing it, and it seems to work out just fine.
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Personally, I used to find the typical "marine/tank" composition so tedious vs zerg just due to infestors.. However, now, playing as pure mech my winrate has skyrocketed. All I can say is what I've faced from Platinum/Diamong Zerg players, based on my own playstyle.
I more often than not turtle with 3-4 bases with really heavy tank/thor composition lategame. I find the typical response to this is HEAVY roach armies, which I just love (11 odd thors just crush roaches, with 7/8 tanks). One hard counter to mech is broodlords, as thors are extremely inefficient in killing them. This relies on you having enough so that the vikings don't clear them up in a few volleys, but also having corrupters to kill his vikings. With broodlords, you can siege his army and kill a lot of it with his own siege tank fire. Combining this with ling counterattacks can often be really hard to deal with as terran, as if you retreat and unsiege, you're easy prey to zerglings.
Also, if you suspect that he's meching, a very early roach timing can be really difficult to deal with, as Reactor Hellion expand is the more popular opening (or FE.)
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edit: herp derp miss read OP settle down
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against mech i always go very heavy ling style. When the lings don't clump up, they are still somewhat okay against hellions, plus they crush tanks/thors really hard. To get rid of hellions i use infestors for fungal (and sometimes banelings if my opponent opened marine heavy into mech, also helps vs nasty scv-pulls for thor repair). When you can chain fungal or blow up all hellions except for a few, suddenly you can pretty much a-move your upgraded lings (and later on ultralisks) and win. And most of the time, your opponent will in fact send his hellions out in a clump, trying to get rid of your creep, which makes the perfect setup for chain fungal. Just be always ahead/equal in upgrades (continous double upgrades, so kinda early hive too, with adrenal glands) and tons of lings, then you have a fair fighting chance.
The roaches were always an on-edge unit for me in ZvT, since they might not get killed by hellions that fast, but on the other hand they are pretty bad against hellions themselves (not as bad as queens, but still not super effective). They are not that fast, are armored (so more tank dmg), and most of all thors are pretty good against roaches since they do not overkill them as hard as zerglings. I could never win a fight decisively against equal opponents, just barely (or get crushed), except for when my opponent went thor heavy and i got as many infestors with neural as he had thor (which went hillarious ofc). But then again, i am only low masters
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On April 13 2012 09:17 AegiS_ wrote: I just wrote a guide on mech TvZ. (http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=328746)
If all of your expansions are upgraded planetaries, drops won't kill them. Therefore you only have to defend your main from drops which you can: -Make turret rings in main with turret range upgrade -Put 2-3 siege tanks well placed in main -Just run back and defend with your army as he can't kill your upgraded expansion planetaries -If late game you'll have vikings, can patrol some outside of main
When a zerg drops my main I usually say.. oooo free units to kill!
Off a large economy I add in 3-4 tech lab'd barracks worth of marauders to help deal with roaches / ultras. That and well upgraded siege tanks should be enough to negate roaches cost effectiveness.
It helps if you read the thread.. This is for ZERG vs Terran mech, not playing mech as Terran
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I want to point out that infested terrans are really good against mech. Not only burrow ambushes - infested terrans are great against thors/tanks, so even without neural, infestors are good. Fungal the hellion/scvs, and spam infested terrans. I do recommend using one burrowed infestor at a time to try to force him to unsiege though, they rarely bring a raven.
I rush to broodlords against mech, and while I am doing it I spend minerals on queens. I use roaches to defend hellion harass, and I'll often churn out a lot of roaches if I think he is expanding too quickly (in which case I want to slow it down) or not expanding quickly enough (in which case I expect a 2 base push). You don't really want to fight his army with them, you want to counterattack and slow him down (drop tech is really good for this, but it delays your hive, so you have to commit more heavily to roaches). If you have to fight, flank from every angle.
While my greater spire finishes I make a few corruptors and immediately morph them into broodlords. It's better to make 5 corruptors and 5 broodlords than it is to make 11 corruptors and 2 broodlords. Budget your gas.
then you have an army of broodlord/corruptor/infestor/queen and you push him back across the map and kill him. Once yo get about 8 broodlords total, you don't need any more. Just rally corruptors constantly. 8 broodlords with queen/infestor can take on nearly infinite terran ground units. They will never die, but they might take a while. The only thing that actually threatens the broodlords is vikings, so you mass corruptors and shoot them out of the sky.
If he tries to base race you instead of engaging your army, race him. Don't turn around. Bring a spine with your queens if you have to. Ideally you can rebuild bases elsewhere, and try to get another spire so you can keep rallying corruptors (because they are the only unit you need to replace in your army).
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On April 13 2012 11:54 Oboeman wrote: If he tries to base race you instead of engaging your army, race him. Don't turn around. Bring a spine with your queens if you have to. Ideally you can rebuild bases elsewhere, and try to get another spire so you can keep rallying corruptors (because they are the only unit you need to replace in your army). I've always wondered whether or not it's better to try and turn around or just go for the race. Is it always better to just go for the race? Or should you just turn around if you're not that far from home?
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On April 13 2012 09:17 AegiS_ wrote: I just wrote a guide on mech TvZ. (http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=328746)
If all of your expansions are upgraded planetaries, drops won't kill them. Therefore you only have to defend your main from drops which you can: -Make turret rings in main with turret range upgrade -Put 2-3 siege tanks well placed in main -Just run back and defend with your army as he can't kill your upgraded expansion planetaries -If late game you'll have vikings, can patrol some outside of main
When a zerg drops my main I usually say.. oooo free units to kill!
Off a large economy I add in 3-4 tech lab'd barracks worth of marauders to help deal with roaches / ultras. That and well upgraded siege tanks should be enough to negate roaches cost effectiveness. So basically when you mech you turtle to 200/200 with planetaries and turrets? Lol any smart zerg will pull out zvp and tech to broodlord/infestor behind a row of spines.
Personally I love to go mass roach with TONS of doom drops. I'll even throw in nyduses for flair. I think the greatest asset when going mass roach is upgrades; they're essential or your army will just get wrecked imo. That said, I do remember this one terran that hit me with a brilliant timing push, +1/+1 and only 3-4 tanks iirc. It was so early it caught me with my pants down and I lost. I'm hoping there aren't any more like him on ladder lol.
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I do a couple of things vs mech. If I scout it early I go roach till around 160, start my hive around 13-14 minutes for broodlord. With roaches I get map control, I position some around bases to stop helliion runbys, and safely take as many gas as I can. My ideal unit comp is Broodlord Corruptor with double spire.
If I am caught going muta ling when I finally scout the mech I spend all of my gas on banes and wait for him to unsiege and take his 3rd and reset his mech count. Then I expand a lot and get broodlord corruptor. Mass bane acts as a reset mark for when I realize I am behind and mess up. This obviously depends on his tank count and his specific comp. It's much better against hellion thor with very few tanks of course.
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On April 13 2012 13:21 TyrionSC2 wrote: I do a couple of things vs mech. If I scout it early I go roach till around 160, start my hive around 13-14 minutes for broodlord. With roaches I get map control, I position some around bases to stop helliion runbys, and safely take as many gas as I can. My ideal unit comp is Broodlord Corruptor with double spire.
If I am caught going muta ling when I finally scout the mech I spend all of my gas on banes and wait for him to unsiege and take his 3rd and reset his mech count. Then I expand a lot and get broodlord corruptor. Mass bane acts as a reset mark for when I realize I am behind and mess up. This obviously depends on his tank count and his specific comp. It's much better against hellion thor with very few tanks of course.
I'd say banelings are only good if you catch him unsieged, and they are NOT good vs thors.. Take 20 banelings to kill a thor, but they kill the squishy mech units (tanks/hellions) really easy.. If he's stupid enough to unsiege all his tanks at once, banelings with speed on creep can easily wipe out the important units.
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Hey there,
only Dia so please consider that. I recently switched out of LingFestor (dat poor Inf control -.-) into LingBaneMuta. In my most recent games I went mass mass Muta vs.pure Mech (or AirMech) into 4-5 base inf/broods. This actually works pretty fine, second Spire for them double ups, all minerals into spines.Unfortunately you absolutely need at least 6 gas for this (in my opinion). It keeps the T at bay, you can snipe new bases, hellions are afraid to move out etc.
Thrors are actually not that good vs magic boxed mutas with decent ups, but you have to be really really careful. One misclick into GG.
Greetz
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I've been thinking that ultras might be better than broods against thor heavy compositions, since an average number of broods (8-10) are barely equal against an equal number thor, but obviously with a tank heavy comp broods are mandatory. Typically I go roach opener into fast third and fourth and spreading a lot of creep and threatening counters while working towards hive.
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On April 14 2012 04:47 KimJongChill wrote: I've been thinking that ultras might be better than broods against thor heavy compositions, since an average number of broods (8-10) are barely equal against an equal number thor, but obviously with a tank heavy comp broods are mandatory. Typically I go roach opener into fast third and fourth and spreading a lot of creep and threatening counters while working towards hive.
If you have even 2 queens with your army, thors are almost completely useless against broodlords. The only significant threat is vikings and thats why you can go mass corruptor supported by ~8 broodlords, infestors and queens. Make sure you bring overseers and overlords. It helps to drop creep and occasionally put down a creep tumour to give your queens some semblance of mobility during engagements.
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Why is roach drop preferred over blings on scvs/lings ? Those have way more damage output, while roaches are a tank unit.
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